Babble

Greetings from Iowa! I’m on my first work trip at my new job and I’m exploring the town on my downtime. And of course, what else does a tea lover do but find the local tea shop, right? Since it’s nearby the University of Iowa, there’s a chain called T-Spoons. I was excited to find they actually had LOOSE tea, but I was disappointed that they only had a four varieties of green (one of which they called yerba mate :-/). But still, it’s tea, and I was really excited! 

I went back and forth between the Plum Passion and the sencha. We all know sencha, but the plum passion looked more like an oolong (they assured me it was green). My curiosity won me over and I had myself a cup.

And…. I think they might have over brewed it a little bit. It’s definitely a little too bitter, but I worry that it’s my fault since I distracted them when they were brewing and they brewed it too long. I’m definitely getting some plum notes, but I can’t get past that bitterness. I think I might get them to remake it when the line dies down a little bit.

As a side note, I couldn’t find this tea anywhere with this same name, so who knows where it actually comes from..

Azzrian sent this to me a while ago, and I’m just now getting to it. I’m not really getting any mint flavor to it, which makes me think it’s no good. Or maybe I’m just expecting the mint flavor to be overpowering, and it’s not. Who knows. It’s just tasting like generic green tea. It’s definitely not bad, but I wouldn’t have guessed one of the flavors would have been mint.

Anyway, I’ll leave a rating off tonight. I’m feeling very “blah” and I’ve been sneezing up a storm. At first I thought it was allergies but maybe it’s a cold. It’s hard to tell this time of year :(

Hey Steepsters. Changed my name. See below for the reason. 

Yesterday was a very stressful day. I had a job interview that lasted a full day. 5 different people interviewed me, and then at the end of the day I had to give a 1 hr presentation. I think it went well, but now the waiting game begins. I treated myself to a massage today since yesterday was quite the challenge. 

Since yesterday was so stressful (and devoid of tea) I thought I would brew up some tea I got in a trade. This is very yummy and flavorful. Not bitter at all and was quite enjoyable hot. I’ll have to try cold brewing too. 

Since I’m applying for a few jobs, but I like my tealog to be able to speak freely, I thought I would change my name(s). If you forgot who I am, just send me a message. 

(Thanks to Crystal and Lady 0f Spaydes for a sample of this)

I changed my picture (no one really uses pictures of themselves on Steepster, so I decided to do the same). However on one browser it shows up as the photo of me and on the other it’s the hamster in a teacup. What is it showing up for everyone else?

Okay, now onto the tea..
This was a sample from momo way back when that I decided to cook up tonight.

When I first brewed this hot I barely tasted anything. I wasn’t sure if this was a bad batch or the tea was just too cold. But now, as it cools, I definitely taste more of the flavor with the pineapple and coconut.. This is definitely a tea to drink cold or cold brew.

This tea isn’t wow-ing me, it’s just okay. I’m leaving off a rating, though, since it might be an older tea and the flavors might not be as spot on as they were when this tea was first released.

Thanks to Zen Tea for a sample of this.

How appropriate, I’ve been listening to a lot of house music and now I am drinking a tea to go along with it. It has such a pretty green color when brewed.

This sencha has a very vegetal grassy smell – it’s definitely green tea. It might be a little bit too much for my tastes, I prefer my greens on the mellow side. However, for someone who wants a quality sencha and isn’t as bothered as much by grassy greens, this is a good choice.

Not the biggest rooibos fan, but this came as a free sample with my Lupicia magazine, so I thought I would pop it in tonight while watching the Lance Armstrong interview on Oprah.

This isn’t bad, and has a nice natural sweetness without needing any sugar. It’s not the best, but the rooibos flavor isn’t super prominent which makes it a little more bearable.

Before all the hype about this tea, I just wanted it because it was a Chanukah tea. It could have been a totally unappealing flavor, and I would have still wanted it because it’s a Chanukah tea. It really doesn’t take much to market to me, eh? But then this tea was getting all rave reviews so I knew I HAD to try it. They sold out of this tea pretty quickly during Black Friday, but lucky the lovely Jackie T was able to send me some so I could see firsthand what this tea was about.

This tea is very nice, and I’m not the biggest fan of black teas. You can taste the marshmallow in there, definitely. I’m not sure if I like it hot or cool better- both are really good. Plus, it looks so sparkly and shimmery. I don’t know if it’s an every day tea for me, but it’s definitely a good desert tea.

Hopefully this tea will inspire other tea makers to come up with other Chanukah teas. I’m lovin’ all the Chanukah love.

Thanks to Nature’s Tea Leaf for a sample of this tea.

For my first steeping of this tea, I noticed it said to steep only a minute. Well, I started steeping it… and then promptly forgot about it. One of these days I will learn to set a timer instead of faking it. Five minutes later, I went back to try the tea – prepared for the worst – and it was actually pretty good. Wow! I’m impressed. Normally green teas are way too fickle to handle a five minute steeping.

This tea is a nice flavor. It almost taste like a white tea and has a very soft taste. Definitely not vegetal at all and a good green for people who don’t like grassy greens (and have a tendency to forget their tea is still steeping – LOL)

Thanks to Nature’s Tea Leaf for a sample of this.

I’d heard of Jasmine Pearls before, but I had never heard of Jasmine Daughter Rings until I stumbled on their site. They’re very similar, but rolled into an “O” shape instead of a ball. It reminds me of the paper curls I used to make out of boredom by rolling a piece of paper onto a pencil. As they unfurl, they lose their curliness and get more flat. The tea is definitely fun to watch.

Even though they are billed as jasmine flavored, the jasmine isn’t overpowering. I found the flavor a little bit off and I wasn’t liking this as much as some of the other teas. I think it might have been the green tea base that I wasn’t too fond of. It tasted a little flat to me. I think I still prefer the flavor of jasmine pearls a little bit better, even though they can be more intense.

Side note: Nature’s Tea Leaf also has a “Dragon Pearls” tea that is NOT jasmine that is actually not that bad. They have lots of unique teas.

I originally suggested this flavor to Stacy when her “create your own flavor” contest was going on. I was thinking of unique flavors to replicate in tea. Chanukah was coming up, and there seemed to be an endless amount of Christmas teas coming out, but no Chanukah ones. So, I suggested this flavor based on one of my favorite Chanukah foods. I thought Stacy would laugh and say, “What a terrible idea!” but I think she was actually intrigued by the challenge.. and so this flavor is born.

(Thanks to Stacy for sending a sample of this my way, btw.)

The smell of the tea is definitely a nice applesauce base. When it’s brewed, without sweetener, you get this nice soft apple flavor with some very faint cream and potato notes. It’s a perfectly nice flavor all on its own and it doesn’t really NEED anything, but… just for kicks I’m going to add salt because I want to bring out those potato notes.

And adding salt definitely changes the taste of the tea. Those apple notes are pretty much gone and it turns into more of a broth soup type taste. How crazy! It’s a transforming tea.

The best part of the tea is that after it’s steeped, you have these real chunks of potato and apple in your steeper basket that you can eat, which I did. 

All in all this is a very interesting tea that is unlike anything I’ve ever tried. The flavors can be subtle, but make for really interesting combination. So glad I suggested it!

Thanks to Nature’s Tea Leaf for a sample of this.

I’ve been having all sorts of random health issues lately, and when I saw this herbal tea, it really intrigued me. It’s supposed to work for a variety of things including IBS and sore throat, just to name a few. I had never had it before, but I was willing to give it a shot.

This is definitely one of the more fun herbal teas. The tea “leaves” themselves are really interesting. It reminds me of cotton. You’re supposed to get 2tsp of it, but it’s really difficult to get exact. I just plopped a bunch on measuring spoon and called it a day. The tea brewed up this nice light-pinkish color. Very intriguing, since you don’t see that too often in tea.

The tea itself has a nice taste. There’s this light sweetness that I enjoyed. It doesn’t really need any additional sweetener and it’s fine on its own. The tea did have a nice soothing effect, as well.

If you want to have some fun, I recommend this fun little experiment:
Brew this tea in T-Sac. Steep as normal, and then take the T-sac out when ready. Let it cool. Then, when it’s cool, feel the t-sac. It has this crazy jelly/gelatin like feel. It reminds me of one of those fun toys at the Science Center. Call me crazy, but it provided amusement for me. Your mileage may vary.

Thanks to Jackie T for this tea.

This was actually tea that I acquired for my boyfriend who loves banana teas. He chose to brew it today, though, and as a tea lover how can I turn down a sample of free tea?

If you love banana flavor, this is a very good tea. The banana flavor is definitely strong in this. Someone once compared it to “Banana Runts” and I think that’s a pretty spot-on comparison. It does have sort of an artificial/candy taste to it. The flavor does work surprisingly well with the genmaicha, I’m actually quite impressed. I don’t taste the cheesecake flavor much when hot, but as it cools that creamy flavor comes through.

If you’re not a banana fan this tea won’t necessarily turn you into one, but it’s very interesting indeed.

Thanks to Zen Tea for this sample.

This is yummy green tea that looks very interesting, too. It has a nice green tea taste that’s not too vegetal, although there are some notes there. It’s more buttery than anything else. It is not overly floral, which is nice since I find a lot of these hand-rolled teas can sometimes tend to be.

A very smooth tea with no bitterness or astringency. Definitely a pleasant tea for green tea lovers like me.

Originally I wasn’t going to order anything from Teavana, but then I made the mistake of looking at their sale and seeing their awesome prices. And then I caved. My order is still in processing (and I’m still waiting on an e-mail from them). This tea is not from this order.

I thought I had ordered this tea, but I looked at my receipt and saw that I didn’t. I was NOT going to go to the mall, but I really wanted this tea, and customer service was not answering. So, I called up my local Teavana to ask if they still had this tea in stock. Sure enough, they did (and lots of it), so hi-ho to Teavana I go. I probably could have picked up some other teas had I just waited, but eh. Here’s hoping my order ships all right because a few of the teas aren’t even showing up anymore.

I also wanted to go to Teavana because I bought a Yixing mug on black friday at 40%. It was discounted to 50% the day after Christmas, and I wanted to get a price adjustment since I was in my return window. Well, I learned that you can’t return sale items (boo). But the manager took pity on me and gave me free tea (yay!).

I almost didn’t pick this tea up at all. So many of this on sale teas had mixed reviews. This one got not so bad reviews. I was warned that this does not have a strong green tea flavor and I will repeat – it does NOT have a strong green tea flavor. I can’t taste any tea at all. The hibiscus is strong with this one, and it’s definitely a fruity tea. It’s a good tea for people who don’t like tea, but from reading the other reviews it also appears kinda finicky. I bet this would be a really good iced tea. I hot brewed this, but maybe next time I should cold brew it.

It’s not overly tart, though, which is nice. I’ll give it a somewhat higher score and cold brew it and see what I think later..

My local tea shop had a blending class for the holidays, and my awesome boyfriend actually bought me a spot in the blending class as an early Christmas/Chanukah gift. To thank him for such an awesome gift, I decided to make a tea specifically for him. I really REALLY wanted to make him a banana tea, but they only had so many flavors and add-ins, and I had to abandon that idea. But while blending and mixing teas, I came across another great idea. My boyfriend loves candied nuts, but they are not the healthiest thing around (plus they are pricey, yo). So I decided to make a tea blend out of it, instead. I also got to cup it along the way, which was nice, but after cupping teas 10 or 15 times, you get a little stick to your stomach. :-p

For this tea, I used white peony (white tea) as the base, added in some chrysanthemum to help give it some nutty taste, and I added cornflower petals to make it look pretty. We had a few flavoring oils we could apply, so I used an almond and caramel flavoring. The almond was nice, but the caramel really gave it that candy coating.

I unveiled the tea at Christmas yesterday and my boyfriend was so excited he had to brew it tonight. The tea has a very strong scent (maybe too strong), but when you brew it, it mellows out. It’s actually quite nice.

The tea master who taught the class thought that mixing such strong flavors with a white tea was a bad idea and I should have stuck to black or rooibos tea. But, whatevz. My boyfriend and I are not fans of black tea, and white tea can be pricey. Plus, white blends are fun. The white tea does take a back seat and you can’t really taste it, but that’s not such a bad thing.

All in all, it’s not bad for my very first tea blend with flavorings. I don’t know if I’m going to become a master tea blender anytime soon, but I think I did well.

Merry Christmas (and happy late Chanukah). I got this tea, along with many others, for my boyfriend for Christmas. He was originally drawn to this tea because he is a fan of the Tampa Bay Buccaneer football team (which didn’t have such a great season this year). He also likes rooibos. I was originally going to buy this tea online but hated the idea of having to buy 4 oz at a time, so I eventually just gave up. Then, one fateful day on my vacation to Austin, Texas, I was browsing in Central Market (a very awesome grocery store) and saw this tea in bulk. Hooray! I could buy a small amount of this tea afterall.

And so, this was the first tea he decided to try tonight of all his lovely teas. It also didn’t hurt that it was late and it’s best to have a caffeine free tea.

This tea is quite pleasant. Rooibos is not always my favorite tea, but this tea is quite nice. I’m definitely getting creamy and some subtle chocolate too. Not really getting much fruity in here, but that’s not okay. There’s a slight bitterness, which is probably from the black tea that I didn’t realize was in here until afterwards – oops. But this tea is still quite lovely.

My boyfriend says, “It has a nice buttery aroma and has a strong rooibos taste. I like it.”

12 Days of Christmas (52Teas) – Day 12

Could it be? I’m actually opening up a tea, consuming it, and writing a tasting note, all on the appropriate day? It only took me a full 12 days to do so!

When I first opened this tea and smelled it, it smelled like the grasshopper cookies. It definitely sounded intriguing. But when I brewed it.. I don’t know, the flavors just fell short for me. I get notes of mint, marshmallow, and even chocolate, but none of them are overpowering. Maybe I’m just so used to my mint teas being overpowering I expect them to? I think it’s also the base. Not really a fan of that, either. Not sure what it is because my black tea knowledge is limited.

12 Days of Christmas Tea – Day 10

Yes, I’m not really logging these in correct order. This one is actually a backlog, but I have other teas I haven’t even tried yet. So .. uh.. don’t expect them to be numerical, but they’ll get there eventually.

This was a custom blend from KeenTeaThyme and it came in a cute little tin and everything. It was actually quite delicious. The spearmint and cinnamon was quite strong, but I didn’t really taste any guayusa. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. This tea also has gold sparkles in it, which I didn’t realize until AFTER I brewed it in a dark cup. D’oh. Next time, I’ll brew this in a white cup so I can enjoy the sparkles.

As a side note, I actually took a tea blending class in early December. I wish it would have been early enough for my Christmas swap b/c I would love to have designed a tea around my Christmas day theme. But, alas, it was not meant to be.

12 Days of Christmas Tea – Day 11

I am VERY behind on my tealogging (and slightly behind on my tea drinking). This came from Sil and it has a very strong scent – so strong I could smell it through the envelope. I originally thought it was a Lapsang base because of the smokiness, but apparently it’s something different (err.. I’m not sure what exactly).

It’s not bad. I’m not a big Lapsang fan, so I’ve got that working against me. I also think I taste some bergamot, so it tastes more like an “Earl Grey Lapsang” (which I’ll have to check after this note if such a blend exists).

I gave the tea to my boyfriend to try without any prior context (a popular pastime of mine) and he said it tasted like barley. I thought that was an odd comment, but when I did some homework, apparently this tea is like a single-malt whiskey (which is made with barley). I also learned what a single-malt whiskey is, since I know so little about alcohol.

So I’m still on vacation in Austin today, and I went to not one tea store, but TWO (I’ll have to write about the other one later). I’ve heard of this tea company before, but I didn’t realize they had a storefront. So, I decided to check it out.

It’s quite nice, even though it’s off the beaten path. At first I was a little annoyed that they only sell loose tea in 8 oz increments OR in tins, but upon further inspection they also sell their flavors in “sample bags” that range around $4. So, that’s not too bad.

I was unsure of whether or not I wanted this tea, so the lady actually offered to brew me a sample. It’s not bad. A little bitter, but that’s to be expected with grapefruit. The flavor was nice, but I didn’t really think it was a tea I would drink every day, so I didn’t buy it. I DID, however, see some milk chocolate with jasmine tea in it, that I picked up for my BF since he LOVES Jasmine. Hopefully he does.

Also, kinda random, but the lady behind the counter kept referring to the teas as "he"s and "she"s. So, for this tea, she would say, “She can be quite bitter without too much brewing, but she has a nice flavor.” It threw me off a little bit.

I’m in Austin this week visiting my friend. Today we went to Central Market, which is a nice-sized grocery store. The tea selection there was AMAZING!! They had at least 50 bins of loose tea – mostly from Rishi and Republic of Tea. And they had lots of packaged tea as well, a lot I had never heard of – like this brand.

I was really hankering for a peppermint tea (because of my ongoing bloated issues) and I saw this brand and type. The first ingredient is peppermint, but there were a lot of other ingredients too. I should have reconsidered when I saw Licorice Root on the list too, but I didn’t.

When I steeped this tea, I was hoping for some yummy peppermint tea with “accents” of other herbs. But what I got was mostly licorice root. Ick. This must be a very detoxifying herb because it’s in a lot of detox teas. My second steeping was less licorice-y and more peppermint-y, which was better, but who wants to do two steepings just to get the taste they like.

All in all, this tea was underwhelming. I was really hoping for more with all the crazy ingredients.

My favorite tasting detox tea is still the Yogi Peach Detox, even though I don’t think that has any peppermint in it at all.

Blehhhhh Steepster. I feel like crap. And I’m also consulting my Steepsterites for medical advice.

Yesterday I had a stomach ache pretty much all day, so I drank various mint teas and herbal teas (like this one). Dinner time rolls around and since I’m feeling kinda bleh, my boyfriend and I go out to dinner to a vegetarian Vietnamese restaurant for soup. Originally I was gonna get pho, but we end up getting something called a “Hot Pot” which is a lot LIKE soup and is often called “Chinese Fondue”. Anyway, we ended up eating the exact same thing since we are sharing it.

We come home to watch TV, I make it through one episode, and my stomach starts hurting like crazy. It has escalated from “stomach ache” to “I think I’m going to hurl pretty soon”. You know the feeling ;) I try to shake it off by going to bed… and proceed to toss and turn for the next several hours because I don’t want to get up and throw up. 3:30 rolls around, I give up the ghost, and go into the bathroom and throw up – of course. I go back, try to go to sleep, but toss and turn for another hour until I get up and throw up again. Bleh. Eventually, I find sleep for a couple hours, before being woken up at around 8 (because my BF is leaving for work) and throw up a third time. Yay. So long herbal tea.

So now I’m trying to figure out what’s going on and how long it’s going to last. My boyfriend and I ate the same thing for dinner, so I don’t think it was food poisoning. The whole day I didn’t even eat anything exotic: rice, vegetables, cereal. I did drink some kombucha, which some would call odd, but my stomach was already bothering me by then. I’m hesitant to blame it on my hippie drink.

I don’t really have a fever. Which makes me think that it’s not the flu. My BF has me all paranoid because he mentioned how his boss had salmonella and it lasted for weeks. Iccch. I’ve been keeping my meat intake low, but the night before last my boyfriend and I did have a raw tuna and avacado appetizer at restaurant (which we’ve had several times before). I had the majority of it, although my BF did have some, too. Is it possible he wasn’t affected by that but I was?

I’d normally be fine letting things run their course, but I’m set to go out of town this Friday. I really don’t want to be sick. I’m really hoping this is just a “day” thing. My stomach still feels a little icky (not as bad as before, though). I’ve been drinking water, but I’m scared to eat anything else. I probably will soon, though.

So I’ve been hearing so much about gongfu I couldn’t resist trying it for myself. Also, this gives me an excuse to buy more tea hardware. I saw this “easy gaiwan” and just had to have it (http://www.yunnansourcing.us/store/product.php?id_product=128). It’s the same one Daniel Scott has in his icon. I don’t know if I’m ready for the “big girl” gaiwans, so I liked how it had handles and a built in strainer. I’m also using a strainer basket (also from Yunnansourcing) and a random 4 oz cup I found in the cupboard. One day I’ll get a fancy tea cup, but not yet.

Also, to keep the water warm but accessible, I brewed some hot water and put it all into a cast iron pot for me to pour in segments as I type. As you’ll see over the course of my “steepings”, the water got cooler more quickly than I thought. So this is why people get a Zojirushi.

I chose this tea because everyone has raved about it, and I was just “meh” about it. I thought brewing it gongfu style might help “bring it out” more and make me see what all the fuss was about. Also, it has gongfu in the name. How can you not love it??

I wanted to be part of the cool kids so I wrote down my thoughts of each steeping. But since this is my first time, you’ll see my notes aren’t quite so refined. Oh well, it was an experience.

1st steep – I was supposed to throw this steep out as a rinse, but I just don’t have the heart, so I thought I would try it. I got some light chocolatey notes. Also, this strainer basket is great, but where the heck do I put it when I’m done with it? Right now I’m just putting it over my gaiwan upside down, but next time I should bring along a plate of some sort. Oh geez, more hardware. This gong fu stuff sure requires a lot of room. This is what I get for not using a “serving pitcher”.

2nd steep (20 sec) – Used more tea this time. Definitely stronger and maltier. I’m getting notes of toast in here, as well. And I noticed the tea mentioned caramel, so yeah, I can see that. This is very different than the first steeping. Except I didn’t remember to swirl the leaves around in the gaiwain. Should I have? Maybe I’ll do that next steep and see how it goes. Also, I should use less water since this first true steeping spilled a little bit because I’m trying to get it just right.

3rd steep – (40 sec) My water has cooled down a bit. Boo. Don’t fail me now cast iron. This is a little bit smoother – not quite as maltier. I wonder if my water isn’t hot enough. Ah well.. Also, I noticed this was supposed to be 30 sec NOT 40 sec. Whoops.

4th steep (50 sec) – Now my water has cooled down quite a lot, even though my cast iron still feels hot. Why have you neglected me, cast iron? Also, I had my first pouring fail. I thought the lid was on properly, but I went to pour and it wasn’t and I spilled some water. Oh well, cleaning it up wasn’t too bad. The tea isn’t bad, but now it’s starting to have this metallic taste to it. Hmm.. I better drink my water fast so I can do another steeping before my water gets too cold.

5th steep – (1 min, 10 sec) – Need to figure out an efficient way to time these things because looking at my watch and hoping for the best probably isn’t going to cut it. So uh.. I guess the steeping time is right. We’ll hope so. Also, this tea is luke-warm and I’m not really tasting anything besides metallic-ness. I guess I need to break down and go make some warm water from the kettle, which is in the other room #firstworldteaproblems.

6th steep – (1 min, 30 sec) – Okay, so I went back and actually got hot water from the kettle. I steeped this the time allotted, and now it’s kinda bitter and extra metalic. Bleh. I wonder if I messed things up by using luke warm water the last few times. Should that really matter? As it cools though it’s not THAT bitter, but it’s that exciting, either.

Okay, I think I’m done with this tea. I gave it 6 good steepings, but I’m just not going to love it, especially near the end. The gongfu experience was fun, but it’s a lot more work than my traditional western style. I’ll definitely try it on some more teas to try and see what fun I can extract out of them.

Okay, take two before I throw this tea bag out. This time I used “green tea” temperature water and steeped it for about 2 minutes or so. I’m hoping to bring these green tea notes out that I supposedly missed the first time around.

And…. no. It still tastes like black tea to me. And it’s still too astrigent for me to enjoy. Maybe even more so the second time. Not enjoyable at all.

Good try, Starbucks, but this random blend brings me no joy. I gave it a shot.